Back when Norman Podhoretz came out with a memoir called I think Making It which mentioned a "dirty little secret" (I'm no longer sure which: maybe that money got more respect than intellect), somebody, probably Esquire, said "it may not be dirty, but it sure is little."

Is it a dirty secret that you can only be a yachtsman/fox hunter/back country skier if you can afford it? Yes, I regard writing as in general a better activity than those. But I don't have an answer.

Work and remuneration is different from a living wage.

The way we consider ‘work’ has changed. Working for remuneration is necessary to exist. This wasn’t so a hundred years ago...’work’ is the new normal. Is that necessarily a good thing?

Would the next shift change it again?

> The way we consider ‘work’ has changed. Working for remuneration is necessary to exist. This wasn’t so a hundred years ago...’work’ is the new normal. Is that necessarily a good thing?

In the history I am familiar with, in many places working for remuneration was typical, common, and even expected a century ago. In most cases a person either worked for remuneration to provide for themselves or another provided for them.

Is there some way in which my understanding could stand to be improved?

I suspect that jelliclesfarm is referring to subsistence agriculture. It's not "work for remuneration". It is still work, though, of the most backbreaking kind, and the work is still necessary to exist.

I'm with you: I know of nothing 100 or more years ago where work wasn't necessary to continue to exist (except among the wealthy, of course).

Joanne Kathleen Rowling says, that title is click-bait ;)

J.K. could afford it because the U.K. subsidized her life with welfare. There should be more of that.

Dirty secret...theguardian.com is located in the U.K And subsidized is a harsh word for something that should be normal.